


Going to the Mountain for a Cup of Tea and Conversation

by ALC_Punk



Category: Doctor Who (2005), Doctor Who: Virgin New Adventures - Various Authors
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-01
Updated: 2007-10-01
Packaged: 2017-11-27 01:26:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/656496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ALC_Punk/pseuds/ALC_Punk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is a house on Allen Road, and many's time they've filled it to the brim. It's just gotten a bit dusty, these days. Rose discovers the house, and learns that there is more to her than she'd thought. Ace gives advice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Going to the Mountain for a Cup of Tea and Conversation

**Author's Note:**

> Set: post-Doomsday, so, spoilers for that. Certainly post-Virgin NAs, and probably quite a few BBC ones.  
> Notes: This came about because I've got a list of women and a list of random words, and the prompt was 'Ace, mountain', but then it was the Allen Road house and Rose was there...

There is a house on Allen Road.

A girl stands inside of it (or perhaps she's a bit older than that, time seems unwilling to commit), her feet almost planted in the foyer.

There's a story that goes along with the house, of course (there always is). Though whether the girl has heard it (she has) is irrelevant to this narrative.

The story says that there is a house on Allen Road and that it stands in every reality--although, sometimes, it's not a house, of course. It can't be a house, every single time, even the house on Allen Road needs its own sort of variety.

"Who the bloody hell are you?" This isn't the girl with her feet planted, this is another girl and she looks tired. Her feet would like to be dancing amongst the stars, but she can't do that anymore. "How'd you get in?"

"There's always a key," replies the other. She was once Ace, but now she goes a bit more esoterically by Dorothy, and she's not entirely certain which name is easier to live with, though they're both masks she hides behind. "He keeps it above the door."

"Did my father send you? Because I'm not fucking going back." The girl demands, her voice ugly with anger. "Did Pete the Impossible Bloody Wonder Tyler send you to drag his errant daughter home?"

"We all know how to find the House," says Dorothy, her tone oblique, and the capital letter quite obvious.

"What?" Confusion colors Ms. Tyler's face, and she almost seems to lose her anger for the moment.

The House knows it can always be found, of course, though only by a select few. It has never been quite certain how that's all entirely possible, of course, but as it's a house, it has never been particularly curious or dwelt on the subject for long. It has more interesting things to attend to, like making certain the attic has a good layer of dust and that the musty cool in the basement doesn't go off.

"Never been sure how, a'course," says Dorothy, shoving her hands in her pockets. She tilts her head, feeling the old leather of her jacket flex in ways synthetic battle armor never had. "Would you like a cuppa?"

Keeping Ms. Tyler off-balance seems to work, for the moment, as she doesn't shout again. Dorothy doesn't wait for more of a response than her confusion and casually walks past her, heading deeper into the house, towards the kitchen that every visitor can find. Even blindfolded, and Benny once swore she'd been piss-drunk, falling over her feet and still managed to find it without half-trying. Dorothy has long chalked it up to simply another peculiarity of the House, like always being able to find the toy in a box of cereal.

"Whatever you're doing, this won't work," says Ms. Tyler, following Dorothy into the kitchen. She's still angry, but it isn't quite so bright as it was before.

Dorothy pulls the tea things from the cupboard they're always in, and glances over her shoulder as she replies, "Your father didn't send me. The Doctor did."

That gets the girl's attention. Even the House can feel her surprise as she stops just inside the kitchen, and stares. "Is he coming, too?" There's such hope and need in the girl's voice, that Dorothy shivers a little.

Her gaze sympathetic, she turns, after turning the kettle on, the water level enough for her purposes. "I should rephrase that, really. He didn't send me, himself. I'm not actually sure he knows about the properties of the House enough to use them--he's not human enough, perhaps. Not very human at all, really."

"Make sense," snaps Ms. Tyler, her tone sharp with irritation.

"I remember hating him as much as I loved him," Dorothy says, instead, her tone wistful. She sets out the blue ceramic teapot, fingers finding the chip in the handle from Fitz dropping it one New Years' Eve.

"Who are you?"

"Good girl. I knew you'd remember your manners, eventually." Her tone equable, Dorothy actually smiles as though she means it, though her eyes remain dark. "Dorothy McShane, and you, are Rose Tyler." She considers including the House in the introduction, but even she thinks that might be entirely too silly.

The House might agree with her.

"How do you know my name?"

"The House. It has a record of every companion he's ever traveled with, including some who would never remember doing so--Benny thinks it's related to the TARDIS in some way. I'm not so sure I give a fuck."

"I don't understand."

Gesturing Rose to a chair, Dorothy checks the water, then goes to join her, sitting in the blue-vinyl chair with a sense of amusement.

"Why did the Doctor send you?" Rose asks. There is something like hope and fear both, in her eyes again, though there aren't tears. Dorothy was expecting tears, and is pleased to find none. She's never been fond of bawling women.

"He's gotten worse at noticing, as he's gotten older. It's the years wearing at him. Someday..." But she stops before pronouncing some awful sentence that the universe might not forgive.

The House seems to release a pent-up breath, and Rose looks away towards the kettle on the stove. "You're not answering me."

"He can't come back here, Rose," explains the girl once known as Ace. In her mind's eye, Perivale village dances for a moment, only seven houses on the village green with no blacksmith to speak of. "He's not like us. He doesn't... he doesn't understand things that seem obvious."

"Stop speaking in riddles," Rose says, her tone sharp again.

"Even if he wanted to, he's not mortal enough to manage the journey. At least," Dorothy amends, her tone rueful, "not without ripping the whole of space and time apart, and that would be shitty for everyone. Might even end the world."

Dorothy blames the House, and Benny, for her vocabulary, and also wonders if the lack of vernacular is simply a holdover from the Professor's glares and amused sighs. Or perhaps it's her own fault, for taking her name back, replacing the girl with the woman and discovering adulthood too quickly.

"The riddles haven't gone away," Rose replies, her tone tart. Though she seems less annoyed and more wistful, again.

"He can't. I'm sorry." The kettle whistles, drawing Dorothy back to her feet. Pouring the hot water into the pot, she asks, "Is peach all right?"

"Peach?"

"For the tea," Dorothy replies. "Or is this too complicated for you?"

"Are you implying I'm an idiot?"

"Not in the least."

The House sends a breeze through the room, as though someone has accidentally left a window open a crack, and there's been a gust outside that caught the crack just right. Dorothy relents, slightly, and returns to the table to sit again. "How did you find the House?"

Rose frowns, trying to remember, and replies with most of the truth, "I don't remember. I think, I just, found it one day, that's all."

A frown of her own makes Dorothy look slightly old, "I should have made sure Benny lost that toss of the coin. I'm really not cut out for this shit. Look, kid, d'you want to go blow some shit up?"

"What?"

"Blowing things up, like Daleks, or Cybermen or Yeti, always makes me feel better," explains Dorothy, "even toppling random governments is fun, 'specially the ones which really deserve it."

Rose just stares at her for a long moment, before a slight smile touches her lips, "Can we topple the horrible governments of the universe? We can't get to them, of course..."

"We can certainly give it a go," Dorothy promises, grin a little mad. She looks younger, now. A wink escapes her, "First, we need to rustle some supplies from the lab here."

"There's a lab?"

"'Course there is," moving, Dorothy grabs her mug of tea and holds the second out to Rose, "You're gonna need this before the night is out."

Taking the mug is strangely like a promise or a passing thought that implies reality might not be so bad as all that, and the House sends another breeze, this one almost pleased. Rose glances up, then looks at Dorothy, her eyes wide. "It's alive, isn't it?"

"In a sense, I suppose. C'mon, we have plans to make." And little time to construct them in, though Dorothy doesn't want to tell Rose that.

They disappear down a corridor, and Dorothy nearly gets them lost going down the wrong set of stairs. But then, this isn't the House she's used to. Once in the lab, they spend the night constructing home-made bombs and laughing gas, trading careful stories and drinking tea until there's none left.

By morning, Dorothy will be gone, but her memory will remain, as will Rose.

Rose will wake sore from sleeping on the floor, and melancholy from the loss of her new friend, but there will be plasticine under her fingernails and round nitro plus balls on the workbench. She'll return home and tell Pete she'll be joining Torchwood whether he likes it or not, and then she'll do what Dorothy does, what _he_ would have wanted.

She will live.

There is a House on Allen Road. And sometimes it's occupied, and sometimes it isn't. But it always holds its secrets, and those who need them, close.


End file.
